I'll believe that the MIDs are more powerful when we start to see benchmarks. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying that there's nothing concrete to base such a claim upon. Comparing Hz between two different CPU architectures are like comparing apples and oranges.

Same for the other factors.

johnkzin,

I would agree that it's always difficult to compare different processors. However, the MIDs are all slated to come with versions of Open Office, which we all know runs very slowly with Debian installed on the NIT. The Gigabye will actually rival the iPhone in that it will have 3G as well as WIFI and GPS. It's initial price point for release in the Taiwan market is $750 USD. Unlike the Aigo, it appears to be slated for broader release, at least to the European market and, possibly, North America.

I'm anxious to see hands on reviews as well as benchmarks. Here's a link to an article discussing pricing of the Gigabyte. http://www.umpcportal.com/2008/06/gi...lability-info/

Exaaaaaactly. I think that'd be pretty neat, actually. It doesn't need to be particularly high resolution or colorful or anything. It would barely use power.

It could be a virtual screen Bluetooth device for things that show primarily static displays like clocks, omweather, calendar, countdown of Bush's remaining days in office, etc.

Remember, first and foremost, it'd be a hard case to slip the N8x0 into to protect it.. THEN it'd just be a cheap B&W eink display on the outside.

Brighter Display (eg.the PenTile display from http://www.clairvoyante.com/)
A2DP support.
More Memory.
A GPS chip that works reasonably well.
Accelerometers for use as an input device.
A faster response time on the touch screen.
A means of streaming windows media.
Skype with video conferencing capability.
IR capability.

I come back from the comment of disliking all kind of add-ons as seperate from the NIT.

My opinion is: do something good, or don't do it. There are too many issues with the GPS chip in the N810. Therefore, either a correctly working internal GPS, or none at all. The same counts for e.g. 3G. If you have a device which doesn't have such chips internally, you allow the user to completely build their own device, but the disadvantage is that such all has to be carried with, and needs their own power source. This contributes to my preference of prefering a good implementation of the chipset. Yes, even if it'd increase the price a bit with 25 EUR. In the end, it is worth it for a lot of users. If I knew the GPS chipset in the N810 was as crappy as-is, I would have thought twice before I bought it. Now, I basically need a Tomtom (also given the lack of good navigation software for the NIT)

Right. But we don't know how crappily it will run on an Atom. As others have pointed out, the Atom cuts some corners for power consumption that may give it performance that is lower than similar Hz chips within the x86 family.

So... until we see Open Office "benchmarks" for the MIDs, we don't know if they'll actually be better at Open Office than the NIT.

I know about the Gigabyte M528. It's one of the MIDs I'm interested in :-)

One of the things I'm cautious about with it, though, is that the Wifi is SDIO based, and it's not clear if it has its own SD/SDIO slot, or if it uses the same SD slot that you use for storage... if it does, then that leaves me wondering how/if you'll be able to utilize both expanded storage and Wifi at the same time.

Then there's the battery life question.

And, last, there's the actual performance question.

All 3 of those things will determine whether or not its price will directly impact the N810/N900. If it uses 1 SD slot for Wifi and storage, has crappy battery life, and underwhelming performance ... then it could be priced at $400US, and I'd still consider the NIT to be a better buy.

On the otherhand, if it has separate SD slots for Wifi and storage, "good enough" battery (4.5 hours/day might actually work for me, depending on how long it takes to charge, how easy it is to use while charging*, and what kinds of external emergency battery chargers I can get), and decent performance compared to the NIT ... then its 3G and x86 compatibility might mean that I'd take it over a NIT even if it was $600.

But until we know those things for sure, with actual concrete use reviews, I'm not going to speculate about "these specs mean it's going to be a LOT more powerful than the NIT".

Specs : Real Performance :: Vaporware : Delivered Products


(* I don't consider the NIT to be very usable while plugged into ANYTHING, whether it's headphones, power, or USB devices, because they're located perfectly for interfering with 2 handed thumb typing. This makes it annoying to actually hold/use it while those things are plugged in. USB devices especially, because they require that the kickstand be open in order to access them ... if the Aigo/Gigabyte-M528 locates its plugs such that you can still fully utilize the device while charging/etc., then I'd consider that another win for the MID)

There are SDIO cards which provide both storage and WiFi. I've seen them back in 2006, but my MID (Sharp Zaurus C1000) didn't support SDIO.

You can use the kickstand to keep your left hand inside, while using the right hand to type and use the stylus. It also has the advantage the device cannot be ripped out of your hands easily.

I get a 900 Series soon

... an EEE901 with 6h+ battery pack and can do/install what I want. I saw the 900 and I can life with that size.

But I don't give up N810 because of Carman. Then, I'm not in hurry with N900 and can wait the first price drop

So, if I have a dozen SD cards, they all have to be Wifi+Storage cards?

And if I want to hot swap them while maintaining an active net connection (to an IMAP server, or a chat server, or something), then what?

1 expansion slot for wifi + storage is bad.

Since they're also going to be using a daughter card (I think) for the HSPA module, why not have that daughter card be HSPA+Wifi? They could even have it be a range of card options, depending on the customer's requirements:

Wifi only
Wifi + HSPA
Wifi + EVDO
Wifi + WiMAX

And when you add/switch a carrier, all you need to do is swap your wireless daughter cards. And then you're not mucking with the storage slot.

And the disadvantage that you can't comfortably type with both thumbs. I've tried it (and I used to regularly do this with my N800). That positioning works great when you're NOT typing. It doesn't work quite so great when you do want to type.

I maintain my assertion about the inconvenience of the N810's port positioning. :-}

USB's bad, for sure, and power is unfortunate; the audio plug, though, is above where my hand goes when two-thumbing. And the audio should be in one end for convenience when pocketing with a headset; the power and USB could be relocated to better places, though. (And I'd have liked the audio on the same end as the d-pad, for playback control, but now I use BT anyway...)

(I more frequently one-finger, FWIW; holding the left hand-through-stand, thumb on d-pad, and running right hand up and down the long axis of the screen like a gantry and picking out letters with my index finger is almost as fast as thumbing, and more convenient to transition pointing <--> typing.)

And if I was in a part of town where I was concerned about the N800 being ripped out of my hands, I think I'd rather have my fingers through brass knuckles than the kickstand.